SHOULD BE KEPT

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 9, Issue 93, 1 July 1946, Page 6

SHOULD BE KEPT

ATOMIC BOMB SECRET GENERAL STILLWELL’S VIEWS General Joseph W. Stillwell does not want the United States' to give away its secret of the atomic bomb. He does not believe that the United States is under compulsion to share the secret with anyone. General Stillwell made these statements on assuming command in San Francisco of the Sixth Army headquarters, overlooking the Golden Gate. “If we developed a field gun which had a longer range, hit harder or was more accurate than those of another nation, we would be under no compulsion to share the design with anyone,” he said in illustration of his views. General Stillwell expressed a hope for a long peace—and issued a grim warning as he spoke. “I think it is quite feasible to have a long period, of peace,” he said. “I don’t see any reason why we should not have that.” He issued a warning, however, that the first bomb of any future war would land in the United States. “We shall be the original target of any nation determined to wage war in the future,” he said. “In the past, we have had two chances. We have had space and time on our side in the previous tym world wars, but the natural advantages of the wide spaces of the Pacific and Atlantic oceans have disappearde. Space does not mean what it did with nations now armed with aeroplanes and rockets. The next time we won’t have time to get ready—so we’d better be ready. Solution of this problem is universal training—and I don’t mean soft training.”